Hyperion Upgrades Having an upgraded Medic unit will help you a great deal as you make your way through the science facility. You begin the mission with only a couple of Marines and Medics and your Medics are your link to keeping both Jim and your troops alive. Having your Medics able to heal quicker is key to this mission since enemies bear down on you fast and hard.

Credits:125,000

Unlockable Unit: None

Missions Goals

Investigate the Dominion Lab on Castanar.

Destroy the fusion reactor.

Escape from the Hybrid.

Raynor must survive.

Bonus Objectives

Find the 4 Protoss Relics for +4 Research.

Kill the Brutalisk for +3 Research.

Achievements

Piercing the Shroud (15): Complete all mission objectives

Lock and Load (10): Locate all 13 weapon pickups.

Not So Brutalisk (10): Kill the Brutalisk without losing a unit to it on Hard difficulty.

Matt and Jim plan ahead for this surgical strike.

If you found the hidden documents in Media Blitz (hidden in the Science Facility in the southeast corner of the map) you get the secret Piercing the Shroud mission. In this mission, you must make your way through the lab to find out what kind of research the Dominion has been doing there and, after finding out what's going on there, blowing it all to smithereens.

Getting to the Hybrid

Move methodically through the lab to reach the Hybrid.

This mission is double tiered, as you must first infiltrate the lab and get to the Protoss/Zerg Hybrid deep in the facility. Your main task is defeating the Dominion forces along the way, and your best bet to do so with minimal loss of life is by keeping your Marines in front of your Medics. This way, they just keep doing the healing while the Marines and Raynor do the fighting.

As you make your way through the facility you will find security cameras that you can hack to help you. When you find the console that controls the left or right side guns, choose the guns that will take out the Firebats nearest the guns as they will do more damage to your troops than the small number of Marines. When you reach the console that releases the Ultralisks, Zerglings, or Zealots, choose the Zerglings as they will wipe out enough of the enemies in that room to make it easier for you as well as not being too difficult to destroy when the door opens for you. When you reach the console that lets you load the A.R.E.S. Warbot, choose the anti-armor ammunition to use against the Siege Tanks you encounter.

You also locate grenades and plasma gun ammunition along the way to the Hybrid; don't be afraid to use it. Use grenades on any group of enemies and fire off a plasma round at heavier enemies to finish them off quickly. Since there are so many ammo pickups throughout the mission you are never at risk of running out. Use the plasma rounds to quickly take down the Brutalisk.

Once you reach the Hybrid chamber destroy the fusion reactor to release the beast. This begins the second portion of your mission.

Escaping the Facility

Just keep moving, using the Chrono Rifts to slow your pursuers' attacks.

This is where the mission simplifies. Do not attempt to kill the Hybrid as that is a fruitless effort and it can't be killed. Simply make your way out of the facility with the Hybrid, Protoss, and Zerg forces on your tail. Do not use 'attack move' at all as you escape as you'll get tied up and quickly overrun by enemies. Use the Chrono Rift ability behind you to stall your enemies and head to the southeast corner of the map where you will find your escape craft.

Protoss Relic Locations

Destroy that holding pen to find one of the relics.

There are four Protoss Relics hidden throughout the map, two of them in the infiltration section of the mission, the other two in the escape portion of the mission. Find one inside the remains of the first Zerg holding pen you encounter and the next in the Ultralisk chamber. The next one is found near the spot where you took control of the A.R.E.S. warbot and the final relic is in a corridor near where the Zerg holding pen was on your way into the facility.

Once you reach the escape shift the mission ends and that is the end of Matt Horner's mission strand.